Lock time

G

greyson97

New member
i made a thread about lever action vs bolt action which would you pick and why. Bud H said bolt and lock time. I didnt know what that was so I looked it up

From what I read on the internet, its the time between trigger pull and firing pin fully indents the round firing it.

bolt actions have lock times in miliseconds which is fast. and i realized how a lever action rifle with a falling hammer would seem slow.

having said that, I have both a hammer pistol and a striker fired pistol, and I notice I'm more accurate with the glock than the px4.

would the small duration between trigger pull and hammer fall affect accuracy? in the hands of someone who is a bad shot and have bad habits would that duration allow someone to upset their shot?

and if that were the case would striker fired guns with really small lock times improve that?

and lastly what are some firearms with really small lock times.
 
IMHO, locktime would only be an issue if you're shooting benchrest. For the average shooter/hunter, not so. Just think about all those falling blocks and rolling blocks with their long, slow hammerfall banging away at distant silhouettes in BPCR.

In a defensive pistol, it's all the way down at the bottom of the list of factors affecting accuracy. If you're good enough to realize the difference, you're not shooting a striker-fired pistol anyway.

I hear this argument often, particularly with regards to single action revolvers, but I have yet to see any real data on the subject.
 
If locktime were the be-all and end-all

... my bet is we'd see a lot more electronic triggers. Forget milliseconds, try virtually instantaneous... at least in potential.

Since electronic ignition systems are pretty rare, my guess is that it just isn't that much of an advantage compared to basic handling skills.
 
It's pretty far down on the list of concerns. With an SA revolver you eventually have to worry about "follow through" or just run a very heavy gun to steady it :).
 
Lock time usually is the time from trigger actuation to primer strike. Some calculations use sear release rather than trigger actuation, since the latter involves a human element.

I have no figures on handguns, but Otteson gives firgures for bolt action rifles. The Mauser 98 is 5.2 milliseconds, and the M1903 Springfield is about one to two milliseconds more, depending on the spring used. Lock times on modern rifles (conventional triggers) run 2.5-3.5 milliseconds. Short lock times depend on a short striker fall, which in turn requires a heavy mainspring to achieve sufficient momentum. Which means a hammer/firing pin that is harder to cock. As has been said many time, there is no free lunch.

Why does it matter at all? Because, while it seems a few milliseconds would not be significant, that is enough time between trigger pull and ignition for the firearm to move away from the sight picture the shooter had at let-off time. This is especially true when, as is often the case, the firearm is actually moving during the time the striker/hammer is falling.

Electric firing reduces lock time to near zero IF the primer is actually fired electrically. But some "electric" triggers use an electromagnet to disengage the sear, so the lock time is still significant.

Jim

Jim
 
Jim Keenan...

... you are correct, which is why I had said, "in potential."

A solenoid system will have a lock time. However, the potential is there to set up actual electronic ignition, which would be near instantaneous.

While this would be expensive, given the number of people who spend a LOT of money modding guns, one would think that if it really conferred a major advantage, we'd see a lot more fully electronic ignition systems.

The fact that we don't is one reason why I don't worry overly much about lock time.
 
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